


The Unfreezing Trilogy

by WhatWldMrsWeasleyDo



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 11:08:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1816375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhatWldMrsWeasleyDo/pseuds/WhatWldMrsWeasleyDo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ron is floating, paralysed, towards the Forbidden Forest. Who is levitating him? How will he escape? And when he can, will he want to?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Unfreezing Ron Weasley

**Author's Note:**

> Big thank you to Tamela for betaing, editing and suggesting. And thanks to JKR for inventing it all.

A wet leaf brushes my ear; I can’t even shudder. Branches come into view and then out again. Above us, the grey sky darkens towards night.

            

  
I float, paralysed, between trees, hearing only birdsong and the tread of one pair of feet through wet leaves. Whose?

  
  
Eventually he speaks, “I’ve been watching you, Weasel,” and the well-bred drawl is unmistakable. Finally I know who, but where is Malfoy taking me? And why? 

  
  
I had another lousy Quidditch practice. Couldn’t keep the Quaffle out of the hoops. And what else is a Keeper good for? No one in the stands tonight, thank Merlin. Just my baby sister and my best friend witnessing my humiliation. So that’s OK then. I mean, it’s not like they’re both instinctively brilliant at the sport or anything!

  
  
I didn’t want to speak to anybody; didn’t want anybody to speak to me. I was in the shower, dressed and gone before Harry had finished talking tactics with Katie. The gloom of the grounds suited my mood. I hefted my broom onto my shoulder and headed away from the school: for a long, solitary, brooding walk.

  
  
I wasn’t aware of my surroundings, was focussed on my own self-pity. I saw the flash of green, but before I’d registered it, my body froze. It was no longer mine; I couldn’t feel or control it. The ground flew up to my face and I wanted to put out my hands. My brain screamed but my voice didn’t do anything. Through the white noise of panic drifted the thought: Full Body Bind.

  
  
The ground never hit me. I waited for impact, but it didn’t come. I saw the grass. I had stopped just short of it. And then my feet rose to the same level as my head before my whole body rose into the air and flipped over, with a speed that would have been sickening. Levitation.

  
  
I could tell I was moving forward by the movement of the clouds. And then there were trees. 

  
  
At a guess, I would say that I’m floating about three feet off the ground. I haven’t hit anything and I haven’t fallen. I’m too disorientated to know which direction I’m heading in.

  
  
So. Malfoy. Is this becoming his signature move? Didn’t he use the _Petrificus Totalus_ on Harry on the train at the start of term? Why can I only hear one set of footsteps? Where are the goons? He never goes anywhere without Crabbe and Goyle. Because he’s small and weedy. If I could move, I could easily take his wand and beat him unconscious.

  
  
Harry reckons he’s got the Dark Mark. What sort of dangerous shit does Voldemort teach you when he makes you a Death Eater? I don’t want to be tortured. I don’t want to die. My brain goes into free-fall. He starts talking again, but I’m panicking too much to make much sense of it:

  
  
“I’ve been watching the way you look at him, Weasel. I know. I watch your expression when he’s talking, watch you follow him around, defending him, tagging along on the little adventures. And I know why. I know how you really feel about him.”

  
  
I didn’t think it was possible to be any more scared. But, I am now. How could he know that? He means something else. How vicious could he be if he had that knowledge?

  
  
His pale, pointy face comes into view - too close to focus. I’m slaloming between trees. Too many trees. We must have moved into the Forest. My mind swarms with visions of horrors with too many legs and eyes. I try to control the panic: they’re further in, we’re keeping to the very edge. I remember First Year. He was scared. He won’t take me in there.

  
  
He’s snarling bitterly now as he says, “But you know what? We’re both out of luck. Because Potter’s straight.”

  
  
Did he just admit what I think he did? I wish he’d stop moving me long enough for me to think. 

  
  
It makes no sense. They’ve been enemies for years. Hermione could explain this to me. Oh hell! That’s what he’s doing. If he fancies Harry and he knows I do too, then he’s taking me somewhere to kill me.

  
  
As soon as I can move I’ll beat him to a pulp. I’ll smash him into pieces with my fists. And then run away. It’ll be his word against mine. If he ever speaks again.

  
  
Why would he kill me? What would he gain? He’s just said it: Harry’s straight.

  
  
I’m dropping, slowly and gently. I feel the ground on my back. I hear leaves crackle. I’m still. I can see bricks. He’s taken me all the way to the boundary wall. It’s almost night now. As he sits down beside me, looking down onto my face, a cloud shifts and moonlight hits him. His spiteful face softens.

  
  
“I’m sorry I had to do this to you. I need you to hear me out and then I’ll let you go. I know you hate me. I have to say this now, because soon you’ll hate me even more.”

  
  
Malfoy sighs and his silver eyes unfocus. For a moment, he is lost in his own thoughts. Then he looks back down at me and, unexpectedly, smiles slightly.

  
  
“I’ve been watching him for years, watching you gazing at him, wishing I could be as open. The more I’ve watched you both, the more sure I’ve become. He’s straight. So straight he can’t recognise how we feel. It wouldn’t even cross his mind.”

  
  
He lifts his wand and I expect a hex. Instead, he runs his wand over his own hands, muttering something I can’t make out. Then he leans over me, concentrating. 

  
  
I can feel movement in the little finger of my left hand. It feels warm and slightly tickly. I wiggle it to make sure I can.

  
  
Malfoy smiles his self-satisfied smile. Git.

  
  
The next finger comes back to life. And now I can feel that he’s stroking it: gentle, fingertip strokes. That’s how he’s unfreezing me. One digit at a time. When I’ve got a whole hand, I’ll punch him. No. I’ll need the whole arm to do that.

  
  
“I’ve watched my own emotions playing out on your face, the feelings I hide better than you do. I mean, more effectively. I do recognise that insults and aggression are not __better__ than friendship. I’m not stupid.”

  
  
Three fingers, four, five. He holds my hand in his two hands and smoothes it between them. When he lets go I clench my fist.

  
  
“I wish someone would look at me the way you look at him. These past few months, this year, I’ve found myself watching you. I want someone, anyone, __you__ , to gaze at me like that.”

  
  
You’ll need to stop being an evil little sod, then.

  
  
I could swing at him, but I’d miss his face from here. And then what? I could only lie here, flailing one arm while he stayed out of reach and maybe walked away, leaving me here, paralysed. There’s no-one else around. He’s my only chance of getting a useful body back. I unclench my fist. And listen.

  
He’s working on the other hand now, one finger at a time again. And he talks: “I hardly look at him these days. What’s the point? And you’ve grown up so much. So quickly. He hasn’t. I haven’t. You’re nearly a man, Weasley. Look at these fingers: long and broad and powerful. A man’s hand. I wish I was tall and strong like you.”  
  
  
I can’t see his eyes, he’s looking so intensely at my forearm as he runs his hands over it. The nerve-endings tingle with life. And then, he lightly runs his fingertips over the live skin.

  
  
I exist from the elbow down on both sides. I’m going to make him wish I didn‘t have that strength.

  
  
Malfoy snorts loudly in exasperation. I realise that up to now he’s been whispering softly - even though there’s nobody else around.

  
  
“I didn’t think this through,” he snaps. “It’s one thing holding you still so you have to listen, but with your face petrified I can’t read your reaction. Only if I free your face now you might start yelling for help before I’ve told you everything.”

  
  
Yell for help? Is there anyone here? It’d be worth a try. Yeah. That’s what I’ll do when I can speak again. I’ll summon my wand and try out a few curses on him, too.

  
  
He’s frowning at me, thin lips pursed, brow creased, eyes narrowed.

  
  
“Eyes so blue,” he mutters. His hands move to my upper arms, stop, hovering over them. He sits back.

  
  
“Hmm. If I do that you’ll be able to hit me. I can’t tell how angry you are.”

  
  
I’m still angry, but it’s under control. I can think things through. I’m waiting ‘til he frees my legs. And then I’ll punch him, lay him out cold, hex him and run for it.

  
  
He smirks. He thinks he’s clever. He points his wand at my face and instinctively I put up my hands but they only move from the elbow down and don’t reach high enough to give me any protection.

  
  
“ _ _Silencio__ ,” he whispers. He runs a finger down my nose. I wrinkle it. And then relax it. I can smell the night air, pine and expensive soap.

  
  
“Strong nose,” he murmurs.

  
My nose, my eyes and my fingers? From anyone else I’d suspect I was being complimented. Maybe even flirted with. But from him? No. It’s part of some deviousness.

  
His soft fingers brush against my face: cheeks, eyebrows, forehead, lips. He pauses for a while, touching my lips, a funny look on his face.

  
  
“Your body’s matured and so has my taste. You’re brave, funny, loyal. I wish I could soften towards you in public. We live in bad times, Weasley. Bad and getting worse. I have a job to do. Something awful. When it’s done you’ll really hate me. You won’t forgive me.”

  
  
I really hate him now, always have done. And I won’t forgive him for this, for kidnapping and imprisoning me. When I get my voice back, I’ll tell him. I’ll tell him what a wanker he is.

  
  
He runs his fingers through my hair, waking my scalp. I don’t know why I close my eyes. When I open them he’s smiling at me, looking straight into my eyes. His eyes are still grey, but not as cold as usual.

  
“You look confused. How can you still be confused? Angry, too, but not furious. Don’t you get it?”

  
  
I twist my face into an expression that tries to say ‘What’s going on? What are you after?’

  
  
“Very well, I’ll spell it out in words of one syllable. I fancy you. Like mad. Like an obsession. I’ve got things I’m supposed to be doing, concentrating on, things my family’s lives depend on. Instead, I think about you. You can’t be that shocked! It’s not surprising.”

  
  
It’s astounding, surreal, weird!

  
  
“Haven’t you looked in a mirror lately? And what kills me is, I know you like boys too, and I know I’m not bad looking and I know you’ll reject me. And it’s all my own fault. Because of the way I’ve always treated you.”

  
  
I’m glad I can’t speak. I wouldn’t know what to say.

  
  
“You can have your arms back. I won’t blame you if you do hit me.”

  
  
He runs a hand down each side of my body: neck to shoulders to elbows. I don’t hit him.

  
  
I’m sick of lying down. It makes me feel so vulnerable. I use my arms to push up off the ground, even though I know I’m still bound, that it’s an illusion of freedom, I’m still completely at his mercy.

  
  
As I move, I hear a light gasp and know he’s watching my muscles flexing, pushing at the fabric of my T-shirt.

  
  
I must be lying on my cloak; it tightens at my throat as I move. He flies forward to undo it for me. I stop choking.

  
  
I can’t sit but I can lean back. I can move my neck now and follow his hands. There’s a gape between my waistband and T-shirt. He runs his finger across the bare skin. My stomach muscles twitch. It’s just a shock.

  
  
“You like that? Good. Have you got sensitive nipples?”

  
  
He’s not going anywhere near my nipples!

  
  
“Fifteen percent of men have sensitive nipples. Are you one of them?”

  
  
He places his hands on the faded red cotton over my chest, slides his fingers together, lightly pinching. My nerve-endings sing out and I bite my lip, arch my back. It’s involuntary. It’s not fair.

  
  
“Oh! That’s fantastic! I wish I had sensitive nipples! Can I take your top off?”

  
  
No bloody way! I shake my head.

  
  
“The shirt stays on, then. I don’t want to do anything you’re not comfortable with.”

  
  
Oh? Apart from paralysing me, abducting me and molesting me?

  
  
He runs his awakening hands over my chest and then my back, leaning round me so that his hair is in my face. It tickles. And it smells of that expensive soap and sweat and something musky which must just be him. 

  
  
I’m glad I’m still numb from the waist down. That could have got embarrassing.

  
  
My arms are starting to go to sleep. I lower myself back to the ground and, when he realises what I’m doing, he helps me - placing gentle hands under me to take my weight, sliding them out again. I’m lying on my cloak.

  
  
He’s leaning over my prone body now. He’s staring into my eyes. He’s swallowing and running his tongue over his top lip.

  
  
It’s a very good thing I have no movement in my lower body.

  
  
Which makes me wonder about him. I try to shift my head to look at his groin, but he’s in loose robes and I can’t tell. I shift my weight round and get my hand between his legs.

  
  
My eyebrows shoot up. He’s very excited! Which will distract him and make him easier to attack when the time comes. His eyebrows have shot up, too. He wasn’t expecting that. Good. It’s about time I stopped being his prisoner.

  
  
Obviously, I’m just lulling him into a false sense of security. As soon as I can stand, I’m still going to smack him one and leg it.

  
  
It’s only to be sure his guard is down that I unbutton his robe. He makes no move to stop me or help me. He stares at me, eyes wide and mouth slightly open. His chest is smooth, pale and almost hairless. There’s more definition than I expected, but not much. He’s not as muscular as me. So I’ll be able to knock him out, even if he fights back. Which I have a feeling he won’t.

  
  
He’s got over the shock and he’s grinning now. I’ve never seen that before. Not a smirk, but a proper, full, honest-to-goodness grin.

  
  
“You like?” He moves one leg over mine. Now he’s straddling my hips. He’s taking control back.

  
  
He lowers his mouth to lick my neck. Merlin! I’m losing coherent thought. My top half squirms under him. 

  
  
I grab his hair and smash his head down. Onto my lips. I’m shoving my tongue into his mouth. To distract him. The plan stands. I’m not kissing him for pleasure. He’s Malfoy. He’s Slytherin. I’m pretty sure he’s a Death Eater. He tastes good.

  
  
My hand runs over his robes, down his back, to his buttocks. I grab. I knead. He grinds into my crutch before remembering. Panting, he stands. I let my hand slide down his leg and he groans. I can’t groan. When I get my voice back, I’m going to tell him how much I hate him while I punch him. And then I’ll yell for help while I run away.

  
  
He’s stumbling backwards, down to my feet, his robes open to the waist. I push up on my arms again, to watch him. He runs his hands over my feet. Nothing happens. He picks up his wand again. It was just lying there, beside us. I could have got it while I was distracting him with the kiss, could have cursed him, escaped. 

  
  
I can see my own wand, now. And my broom. Just a little further off.

  
  
He’s blinking and swallowing, trying to calm himself. He mutters and works the wand over his palms again.

  
  
I seem to remember there’s a single incantation to lift a Body Bind. And when do I get to speak again, bastard?

  
  
And when I do, what will I say?

  
  
He still can’t wake my feet.

  
  
“Bloody Quidditch boots!” he grunts. Time stands still as he fumbles with the laces. He’s not in control of his movement. And I’m relying on him get me walking again. My future health is in his hands. And they’re trembling. Because of me.

 

  
His blond hair falls over his face as he works at my feet. Moonlight suits him. Whatever else Malfoy is, he's not bad looking. He tugs off the boots.

  
  
I can still run away in my socks, but not as fast. I’ll have to beat him ‘til he blacks out first. He’s massaging my calves now, stroking my shins. Left knee. Right knee. 

  
  
He makes the mistake of crawling up me with my leg between his. When I can kick, I’ll do him an impressive injury. I can feel how distracted he is. There’s no way he can think straight with all his blood in his pants. He rubs against me as he rises up my body. I’m just flexing my leg to make sure it’s still working. I’m not rubbing back.

  
  
And now he’s reached it: the central area, the only place that’s not awake yet. What happens now? How will it feel when he …? What state will I be in? He’s touching my arse. Do I need the rest of my body? Can I strike now? Escape? Hermione will know how to get my voice back. She doesn’t need to hear all the details of the ambush. I could even make myself sound heroic. Why am I hesitating? His hands slide to the front of my body. Both of them. So he hasn’t got his wand, I could …

  
  
Or, I could lie here with one hand in his hair and the other clawing his back and let him touch me there.

  
  
Oh! I … um … mm … Oh, Hecuba! Oh, no … it’s … oh no. Oh! Yes!

  
  
I can move. I can make any movement I choose. So I push over, roll; I roll him underneath me. Just to show I’m in control now. And I’m only pushing my mouth onto his to make him drop his guard. The plan depends on me grinding into him, pulling up his robes. The plan? There was a plan?

  
  
Or is it just two boys, nearly men, rolling on the ground, pressing their bodies together? Thrusting and wriggling until he cries out, throwing his head back, issuing a noise that is pure animal, beyond control. I’m sticky between the hips, but it’s not mine.

  
  
He gazes at me as I keep writhing. He looks confused, blinking. Then he’s rolling me onto my back, straddling me into position while my hips buck. He reaches for something. 

  
  
His wand is in my face. It was him who had a plan all along. 

  
  
I should care.

  
  
But I understand when I hear myself moan. I can speak! I could shout, scream, yell, or curse! And what I say is: “Draco! Draco! Draco!” He moves his hands back onto me and I climax in an uncontrollable wave.

  
  
It is completely dark now. It’s night. One of the heavy, black clouds must have covered the moon. And it’s raining lightly. I lie on my back on the forest floor and stare into nothing. I feel the water droplets cooling my face, feel his arm flung over my chest; I hear wet pattering on fallen leaves and his breathing.

  
  
My hand finds his head. I can only move slowly. I run my fingers through silken hair. Then do we doze? I don’t know. The cloud passes and there’s silver light again. He sits up: He, Malfoy, enemy, most hated and feared Slytherin.

  
  
I stand. Slowly. Wet socks remind me that I don’t have my boots on. I find them. And my cloak. The only sounds are the increasing rhythm of the rain and an owl screeching.

  
  
I walk away.

  
  
“Ron!”

  
  
I keep walking. I don’t look back. I didn’t even know he knew my first name. I turn to look at Draco.

  
  
He’s still sitting on the wet ground, holding out my wand and broom. I walk back and then, while I’m taking them from him, I kiss his forehead.

  
  
And then I fly, dazed, back to school.


	2. Unfrozen Thoughts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ron and Draco shared a secret moment. Life goes on. Only they have changed.

Well that didn’t quite go according to plan, did it?

 

The future of the Wizarding World depends on my having a clear head. My family’s very lives depend on my ability to stay focussed. I have a job to do and a limited amount of time in which to do it.

 

Yet every time I secure myself within the Room of Requirement to work on repairing the Vanishing Cabinet, the unaccustomed solitude drives the plan for its repair out of my head by letting in thoughts of muscular, freckled arms, a long back, blue eyes and ginger hair.

 

 

I am clever enough to overcome this obsession. I will free myself. Unfortunately my first attempt backfired so badly that I have in fact intensified the problem instead of lessening it.

 

My plan was: to declare my interest in Ron Weasley in a manner designed to increase his already considerable loathing for me, to consequently suffer rejection, probably including a physical attack, thus forcing myself to feel resentment leading to dislike and hence an end to my current state of mind. I had planned to then Obliviate him. My head would have been clear. I would have been capable of killing Dumbledore. He wasn’t supposed to respond.

 

*X* 

 

Usually the best thing to do with something confusing is to ignore it. It was such a weird thing, way beyond any of the weird I’d had before, that it was easy to pretend it just hadn’t happened.

 

Sure, for a few days I ate with my back to the Slytherin table.

 

I’ve got Lavender now for snogging and Hermione acting all jealous and Harry’s always got stuff going on. There’s Quidditch and N.E.W.T.s, family stuff, Order of the Phoenix stuff, Dark Lord Rising stuff. No time to think about anything else. Even if it was something comprehensible.

 

Sure, for a couple of weeks I made myself late for Potions lessons, so we wouldn’t be waiting in the corridor outside at the same time as Malfoy.

 

*X* 

 

He’s always late for Potions now. That section of dungeon corridor used to be one of my favourites. I could gaze under cover of a smirk; speak to him under cover of an insult.

 

Potter is watching me but I’m sure he doesn’t know anything. He doesn’t know the task I’ve been set and Weasley hasn’t told him about the events by the boundary wall. I should forget it ever happened, pretend I never abducted him, paralysed him and declared myself to him.

 

Yet, I feel his thigh between my legs when I close my eyes.

 

*X* 

 

Harry’s obsessed with Malfoy. He’s practically living in that Invisibility Cloak, trying to find out if he’s up to something.

 

I probably ought to tell him what I know . Malfoy admitted he was doing something, something that would make me hate him even more than I already do.

 

But, how would I explain it to Harry? How could I expect him to understand? His enemy gave me an orgasm. I’m pretty sure that’s not what best friends do.

 

Could Malfoy have anything to do with Katie and the cursed necklace?

 

He is an evil, slimy git after all.

 

It’s just that he’s smooth-skinned and slender, too.

 

It’s not me who’s obsessed with him.

 

*X* 

 

Weasley is my king. Last year that was sarcastic. How ironic! I delighted in tormenting him. Him more than anyone else. His reactions are always so clearly apparent: spelled out in colours on his skin. Red usually.

 

I began to wonder. When his complexion flamed with anger or embarrassment I would wonder whether that was how he looked when he was aroused. I imagined him blushing as he stroked himself; I imagined him blushing as I stroked him. I pictured all that Pure blood rising to the surface.

 

Now I know I was wrong. He wears a special deeper, darker claret colour for sex. It begins on his neck, spreading slowly down his collar bone, up his jaw, then rapidly over his chest. Beads of sweat shine on his forehead and upper lip. Next time I’ll lick them off. There won’t be a next time.

 

It’s been a long time since I’ve fantasised about Potter when I masturbate …

 

*X* 

 

I hardly ever think about Harry when I wank now. Even when I try to, my head gets full of wet leaves …

 

*X* 

 

… I picture dusk beyond the trees, a broom lying in long grass …

 

*X* 

 

… slim, pale fingers brushing across my skin …

 

*X* 

 

…a muscled chest of ginger hairs and pale pink nipples …

 

*X* 

 

… silky hair the colour of moonlight.

 

I press my nipples between my fingers. Exactly the way he did.

 

Sometimes it’s like I can smell him …

 

*X* 

 

Sometimes I can almost smell him.

 

*X* 

 

I remember what his voice sounded like saying my first name.

 

*X* 

 

I hear how he cried out my name when he climaxed.

 

*X* 

 

But during the daytime I’m fine. I try to get my head round the lessons. I get pissed off about all the homework and Slughorn ignoring me. I get turned on and wound up by Lavender. I get excited about coming of age on my birthday.

 

There was this one time, we were rushing down a corridor and he just turned this corner straight in front of us. He nearly bumped into us. I wasn’t expecting him. I did react a bit then: goosebumps and, you know, just a bit, like, down there.

 

 

It’s hardly my fault.

 

Him and Harry looked each other in the eye, circled round each other, sneered. We hurried on. I didn’t look back.

 

*X* 

 

His face! Priceless! Of course, the Mudblood and the hero are too self-absorbed to have noticed. It means he does think about me. Which is exciting. Which is a very bad thing.

 

*X* 

 

He’s a ferrety little bastard. Why couldn’t he have left me alone?

 

I’m not responsible for how my body reacts. I’m a teenage boy for fuck’s sake!

 

I’m not dwelling on it.

 

I’m over it.

 

He’s loathsome.

 

 

I mean, You- Know- Who has returned and wants to off my best mate. I’m hardly lying around thinking about some Dark scum’s pale skin. Am I?

 

I mean, if it bothered me, I’d have told someone by now, wouldn’t I?

 

*X* 

 

If I had never touched him, then I would never have known. Or, perhaps I had touched him before and never noticed. But, I noticed on that evening last year in Umbridge’s office. She took off into the Forest with The Chosen One and the Buck-toothed One and left me in charge of the rest of the prisoners. I was quietly furious. She’d used my people, we’d even let her call us her Inquisitorial Squad, until it got interesting. And then we’d been dumped.

 

We would just have to make our own entertainment. Two girls, Longbottom and Ron. Bulstrode was welcome to Longbottom, I like a bit of fight in my victims. My boys could enjoy themselves with the girls. There was only one there that I could ever have got interested in tormenting. I never realised how interested until I touched him.

 

Warrington had him in a half-nelson. As soon as Umbridge left the office, he shoved Ron face-down onto the desk, grinding his bleeding lip into the wood. That was a nice sight. He was struggling, writhing under Warrington. Then there was a flash of green light, Warrington fell to the ground. I never saw which Gryffindor started it. Weasley was going for his wand so I leaped on him. I grabbed his arm.

 

I froze. I could feel the warmth and the movement of the muscles under my hand. I felt Greg fall onto me, or was he helping me? There were spells going off all round me. All I knew for certain, though, was that Weasley’s body was pressed between the desk and mine. I had him bent over the desk. I shifted round. He struggled, his buttocks and back pushing against me. My concentration was shot.

 

Then my face exploded. My hands went to it. I think I fell down. There were bats everywhere, mostly round me. My nose felt like it had burst open. Leathery wings whipped at my head.

 

By the time I could see, he had gone. They had all gone. He was gone.

 

*X* 

 

So there was this other time, in Charms, the other week. Neville got something wrong somehow, I don’t remember the details, but Malfoy made one of those spiteful little remarks that he thinks are so clever.

 

Which would have been good, would have bolstered the hate, which is the only antidote to that other feeling, only then Dean yelled over at Malfoy that he was a tosser.

 

I could have done without that.

 

 

I was lost for the rest of the lesson.

 

I was imagining Draco tossing himself off: in bed, in the shower, standing, sitting, lying down, crouching over in a squatting position, with his wand up his arse, on a broom, in the library. I think I must be pretty sick. 

 

*X* 

 

I needed to purge myself of my feelings for him. I had to get him alone. And he’s never alone. I didn’t have a great deal of time for planning. I already had Dumbledore’s death and the over-running of the school to plan. My mother’s life was threatened. My father was in Azkaban; nowhere is safe from the Dark Lord. I knew I was being used to punish Father. Nevertheless, it was my chance to prove myself, hopefully to find favour and, with luck, earn myself a Mark like Father’s and Aunt’s. I was excited and just a little frightened.

 

I was terrified.

 

I still am. Dumbledore is still alive; Hogwarts is, as yet, impregnable.

 

The fact that Ron Weasley kissed me has changed nothing. It hasn’t even stopped my fixation with him.

 

In my dreams, we go further than we actually did at the edge of the Forbidden Forest that evening. We make love. Which is a ridiculous description for something done by two people who hate each other. But, it’s tender and gentle and there’s no other description for it.

 

I can hardly be held responsible for my dreams, now, can I?

 

I can’t be seen to be weak. There are expectations that come with the name. I have spent my entire school career building a respected position in my house. I can be bad-tempered; in fact, I am expected to be bad-tempered. But I mustn’t be frightened or sad.

 

I lock myself in an empty loo sometimes and have a good cry.

 

*X* 

 

I never fancied Draco, I mean, Malfoy, before he abducted me. That’s a bit weird, really, seeing how good-looking he is. I think I was maybe too hung up on Harry to notice anybody else.

 

But he’s right, Harry’s straight. There’s no hope there.

 

And strangely, that doesn’t matter now.

 

I should be devastated.

 

I feel free, now I’ve stopped obsessing over my best mate. Only it’s worse. Cos now I’m thinking about the bloke we’ve always hated instead.

 

It’s fucking with my head.

 

*X* 

 

Full Body Bind is easy. Basic second year stuff. Granger threw it at Longbottom in first year. And anything she can do …

 

Levitation is trickier. I used to practice it in the Room of Requirement with Greg and Vince keeping watch outside. They thought I was busy on the orders of He Who Must Not Be Named. Which I would have been if I could have held my concentration long enough. But, the magic working the Vanishing Cabinet was complicated stuff. And, Weasley’s shoulders are simply gorgeous. So, when I gave up in frustration, I would levitate the junk lying round in there: sherry bottles, books off tables, a tiara onto a bust.

 

It was while I was researching the delicate restorative charms necessary for the cabinet that I came across _Depetrificus Specificus_ , the spell to awaken by touch. That night in the shower, I realised how I could make use of it.

 

If I removed the Bind gradually in this way then I could demonstrate my good intentions, while giving myself time to explain. I still expected to be hexed, insulted, hit and certainly rejected. That was the point, after all. That was to be the cure for my infatuation.

 

*X* 

 

Sure, I picked up that copy of the Slytherin Quidditch team photo and tore out the captain. Maybe I do keep that fragment of paper in my shoe.

 

*X* 

 

At first I thought that everything was working. I caught him leaving Quidditch practice alone, paralysed him and then levitated him through the cover provided by the edge of the forest, down to the boundary wall. I laid him on a bed of leaves, gently though he could not feel.

 

The moonlight shone on his ginger hair, sparkled in his terrified eyes. I had to concentrate hard on my hands and my wand to achieve the non-verbal _Depetrificus Specificus_. I touched him for the first time ever. I touched his little finger. The nail was ragged, the knuckle bruised, the tip ink-splashed. I touched it. I stopped breathing. Warmth flowed into his finger from my hands. I clasped it. It moved. I exhaled. I let go.

 

I stroked every inch of his flesh. I felt it soften, warm, move under my touch. Perhaps you think me a fool. Perhaps I thought you foolish enough to believe me. But no, I was of course aware that the _Depetrificus Specificus_ would require that I touch every part of his body. When I first read that, it seemed such a beautiful bonus. At times during my planning stage, indeed, I forgot my actual motive and that seemed to be the point.

 

I did know, too, that I might not be rejected. The potential for his physical response became the basis of my fantasies. But I didn’t expect it to happen. I did not make provision for that eventuality. For feeling the way I do now. When he had control of one hand, he clenched it into a fist. I thought everything was going as expected. I thought that he was going to break his spell with that fist.

 

*X* 

 

He saw me. Me alone. He touched every square centimetre of me. He looked at me. I was single. I was not a gang of brothers, a dorm of boys, a class of pupils or a trio of heroes. I was only me: Ronald Bilius Weasley.

 

He was two hands, two eyes, one mouth.

 

*X* 

 

I described to him my desire for him, how it raged in spite of my knowledge of his hatred for me. For five years, I have sprayed my father’s disdain in his direction: insulting his family, his intelligence, his poverty, his lack of finesse. I have sought out his weaknesses, highlighting them in front of others and steadily tweaking his easily provoked temper, mocking him when he reacted. I have been unbearable.

 

It should have been so easy. He shouldn’t have been aroused by me touching him. He certainly shouldn’t have kissed me. As he flew back towards the castle, I sat in the rain, half undressed on wet grass, watching him and feeling the happiest I have ever been.

 

Consequently, I have not carried out The Dark Lord’s orders. I’m sure that I do have the potential to be ruthless. I am a creature of viciousness. I must damp down these soft feelings. I have a new plan. It’s a good plan. I have mixed the poison with the mead. All I have to do now is to work out how to get it to Dumbledore.

 

*X* 

 

Sure, for a few weeks I cried myself to sleep because nothing that mysterious, or overpowering, or beautiful will ever happen to me again.


	3. Unfreezing Draco Malfoy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Each man kills the thing he loves, according to Oscar Wilde, and Draco is afraid that's what he has just done.

The Hand of Glory: it gives light only to the holder. That would be me, Draco Lucius Malfoy. That is how I am able to sneak unseen through the school corridors at night. I have wrapped its fragile fingers around a lit candle which I charmed to not drip wax. Holding its desiccating flesh I can see everything. Barefoot, my footfalls are silent. The rats don’t scuttle away at my approach. Nobody can tell that we’re here - me and the limb of a long-dead wizard. The portraits are not disturbed in their sleep or other nocturnal activities. I am as good as invisible.

I’ve been here like this many times before. Some nights I feel smug or proudly powerful. Occasionally I experience a rush of excitement. Not tonight. Tonight my guts are as lifeless as this arm. My palms are sweaty, mouth dry and heart pounding for quite a different reason. I step over Mrs Norris; she is none the wiser.

It was lunchtime when I heard what had happened. For over twelve hours I have had to maintain an expressionless façade while I died inside.

I have killed him.

I crouch down to take careful hold of the bottom hem of a tapestry. I lift it as high as I can without making a noise and then crawl underneath it. The cold of the stone bites through the flannel of my winter pyjamas. Sensation is a shock. I have been numb. Safely on the other side of the fabric, I stand up in the secret passageway.

It was Millicent Bulstrode who brought the news back to the Slytherin Common Room. Naturally, I had already noted his absence from the Great Hall at lunch, but who could I have questioned without arousing suspicion? That vicious elephantine girl was gleeful: “Potter was sucking up to Slughorn again and he’s managed to get his Weasel poisoned!”

I knew, of course. Straight away I knew. Professor Slughorn had failed to pass the mead on to Dumbledore. I had killed him: my secret.

  
Not everyone laughed. Slytherins aren’t all as bad as people think we are. Losing all strength in my legs, I sank into an armchair and attempted a sneer. I think I pulled it off. While my housemates gossiped about it, I tried to look bored, as my heart sank and stopped, my mind whirled.  
  
I had killed him. I have killed him.  
  
At the end of the passageway is a door, I whisper a charm onto the hinges to ensure that it opens silently. Then I need only cross one corridor. If he has survived then that is where he will be.

He won’t have survived.  
  
Potter’s meant to be a bloody hero. What use is that if he can’t even save his best friend? I know how potent that poison was. I made absolutely sure of it. Potter won’t have saved him.  
  
I’m gripping my wand with one hand, the dead arm with the other. Hands clenched tight. White knuckles. Clear even on my skin. Never thought I’d see my hand whiten. My knuckles. My bones. I transfer my wand to my sleeve to free one hand to open the door. I’m shaking so badly I nearly fumble it.  
  
I’ve been so frightened for so long that I didn’t think it could get any worse. Instead I have found a further fathom of fear through which to fall. I am but a veneer. Beneath the curled lip there is only ice and putrefaction. There was one warm, living, hidden glimmer. But I have killed him.  
  
I wait outside Pomfrey’s lair. If she is tending to a patient with the lights on when I open the door then I will be discovered. There is no point in my being here; there is no way that he could have survived. I have killed him. I should go back to my dorm.  
  
I will just have to smirk my way through this. I can do it. I always do: Don’t you know who my father is? You should be more careful, I have dangerous connections. I am above your silly school and its petty rules - or perhaps I would draw less attention to myself by playing within the system: Prefects are entitled to -- I forgot. They took that away from me. I just started the year and it was gone. Nobody said that it was due to Father’s arrest, but it … It hardly matters. It barely stings. All our lives are at stake. What’s a little dent in the Malfoy pride? 

I’ll just ask for something to ease a headache. It’s a legitimate excuse. I even have the headache. I always do.  
  
I need to know whether the room is lit, whether I will be seen. That’s the problem with this torch, I can’t tell how the world looks to everybody else. I place the Hand of Glory carefully on the floor. I must not lose it. I must not let the candle blow out. I rest it against the side of my foot and let go. Absolute darkness. It rests my eyes. Strange, the comfort I find in the dark. I could happily sink into permanent darkness. It would be so easy. I could give up, let go, stop fighting. Forever rest.  
  
Tempting, except that my parents’ lives are in my hands too - my pathetic, white, shaking hands. I have to continue. And - who knows? - I might find a reason to keep going, inside the next room: breathing, alive, with a heart that beats and muscles that can tense and relax. I know he won’t be there. I turn the handle, push on the heavy wooden door.  
  
If I were more courageous then this would not have happened. The necklace and the mead are the ploys of a coward. I know myself. That is what I am. I had hoped to be able to kill from a distance, had hoped to avoid my victim’s eyes as he fell. The distance left spaces where errors could occur.  
  
Two innocent victims.  
  
A hero would have walked straight up to the Teachers’ Table in the Great Hall and performed Avada Kedavra, coldly watched the old man crash lifeless to the floor, and been dragged off to Azkaban. To be safe with Father, knowing I had done all in my power to protect Mother. It would have been all over months ago. He would be alive now.  
  
I have opened the door. Beyond it is also darkness. I reach down to pickup the dead flesh against my ankle. I listen hard. All I hear is my own blood pulsing. I have learned how to live inside despair. It is this hope that could finish me.  
  
I swallow, I breath. I try to be calm. Ice cool. I hold up the Hand of Glory, blink, let my eyes adjust to its illumination.  
  
Only one bed is occupied. Vomit rises; I swallow down its taste of decay. Softly, slowly, I step forward..  
  
I clap my free hand to my mouth, muffle my own gasp.  
  
Ginger hair!  
  
Another step. A deep breath.  
  
Long nose. Freckles. Long, red eyelashes.  
  
He’s alive!  
  
In my chest, something warm flickers back to life. I breathe deeply. I had forgotten that my lungs had so much capacity. My knees stop working and I sink to the floor, bracing, conscious of the need for silence, as I land.  
  
I have not killed him.  
  
Of course, it’s not important. It was only ever about sex. There’s no more to this obsession. Couldn’t be deep. He has a good body. I wanted to play with it so I did. I might even do it again. Malfoys deserve the best of everything. No more to it than that.

  
I can go back to my bed now - should start to walk back now - now that I know which side of the veil he lies. My feet are cold. I’ve just noticed how bloody freezing my feet are. My hair is sticky with cold sweat. The headache has intensified. It has localised over my eyebrows. Why am I pressing my back teeth together like that?  
  
I expect Potter saved him. He usually does. I need sleep. I should go back. It was only a sex thing after all. I am reassured that he’s not dead.  
  
I sit on the floor, dead arm over my knees, wand up my sleeve, head in hands. He is but a few feet away. In bed.  
  
I really must get back to the dorm now. He’s not dead. I have only made him very ill. He will recover. Probably.  
  
He is in this room. In bed. In the dark. Just him and me. I only need to stand up and walk for a few steps to reach him. I feel myself smile into the darkness. If I did go over to him, then what would I do? Touch him? He’s unconscious. Am I a necrophiliac? What then? Watch him sleeping? How unbearably, pathetically sentimental would that be?  
  
I take hold of the Hand of Glory and rise to my feet. I walk to his bed. I might as well have a quick look as I’m here. My footsteps are soft. The only sound in the room is his breathing. He is breathing. His chest rises and falls. Inexplicably, that fans the flicker of fire in my dead heart. Warmth spreads slowly over my ribcage. Mostly the sound is even, with just an occasional jagged judder. That’s hardly surprising, given what he’s been through, what I have put him through.  
  
The grey school blanket is pulled up to his chin and tucked tightly round him. He’s pale, with an unwonted darkness under his eyes and around his mouth. His hair fans out - tangled and lank - over the white linen pillowcase. He turns his head, moaning lightly. A new heat awakes in my groin and, when I realise my reaction I blush, the colour rising unwitnessed. I cool my cheeks with my icy hand.  
  
I am watching him sleep. That’s ridiculous.  
  
I wonder if he is dreaming. I wonder, does he ever dream of me?  
  
I nearly killed him.  
  
I move closer. My thighs are against the cold metal of the side of the bed now. It’s not like anyone will ever know. Would he wake if I touched him? If he stayed asleep would I keep touching him? Even if he opens his eyes, he won’t be able to see anything.  
  
His fringe is in sticky strings across his face. I reach out my bloodless fingers and they don’t shake. Surely now is when I should be trembling? I push back his hair, touching his forehead. He is mildly feverish. My hand must be too cold for him, he shivers in his sleep. I rest it on the top of his head. Perhaps I can warm up as I cool him down.  
  
There is a scent in the air which I recognise. I lean forward over him, inhaling. It’s stronger than usual, that’s probably due to the high temperature. He smells like home. It heats my balls and warms my guts.  
  
What am I doing, one hand holding dead flesh, the other resting on a living skull, relishing the stink of a sick man’s sweat?  
  
I push my fingers through to his scalp. He doesn’t wake. I should go now, before he does. I need my bed; my feet are icy; my eyelids are heavy. I stay where I am. Madame Pomfrey could come out to check on her patient at any minute. I don’t move.  
  
Candlelight plays over his features, casting shadow under his long nose. I want to stroke that length, but I can’t let go of his head and if I don’t hold the Hand of Glory then I won’t be able to see him any more.  
  
I bend forward. He goes out of focus. My nose touches his. He whimpers, his hot breath blowing across my lips. I pull back. His lids are fluttering. I can see a scrawling of blue veins through the thin skin there. As I approach him again warmth rises from him, heating my lips before I make contact.  
  
Control breaks. I’m planting soft kisses over his face and neck, my palm is stroking down from his head. Redness clouds my vision. What am I doing? He won’t stay asleep through this. I can’t find the strength to stop.  
  
He sighs in his sleep. I think he’s still asleep. My hand has reached his shoulder. There is a barrier of coarse fabric between his skin and mine. With the hand that holds the Hand, I try to push down the blanket.  
  
In a voice thickened by unconsciousness, he murmurs, “Draco.” Fear shoots ice down my spine. I straighten up, back away. His eyes are still closed. I pass my candle in its macabre holder over his features. I’m certain he is not awake. How could he have recognised me? Was it my scent or my touch? A glow spreads across my chest. Or is he dreaming about me? Fire hardens my cock.  
  
I suddenly find myself in darkness, disorientated, something heavy pinning me down, my face pressed into something suffocating soft.  He rolled over, hit me, making me lose my footing and knocking the Hand from my grasp. I landed on the bed beside him, his heavy arm pinning me in place.

  
I pull in rapid, shallow breaths, panicking. I can’t move, can’t escape. In the morning I will be discovered. I will be found sharing a bed with a boy, a Gryffindor boy whose family is loathed by mine, an unconscious boy, a patient recovering from a potentially lethal poisoning. News will spread through the school that I was molesting him as he slept. My fellow Slytherins will despise me. They will tell their parents. The Dark Lord will learn that I am infatuated with one of Dumbledore’s favourites.  
  
I hear my pulse: too fast, too loud. I feel my ribs expand and contract. Light flashes at the edges of my vision. I’m going to pass out.  
  
He whispers my name again - his hot, sweet-scented breath rolling over my face. His warm, well-defined muscles lie over my chest. His next movement brings our heads together. His stubble scrapes my neck, his lips my jaw. That must be his lips, softer, damper than the rest of his skin. I’ve forgotten what it was that I was worrying about. I can’t move much, but I can twist my neck and that’s all the movement I need to reach my lips to his.  
  
To start with there is a soft vagueness in his kisses. Gradually they gain strength and precision until I know he’s awake. I respond. I push my tongue into the moist heat: thrusting, exploring, caressing. His taste still holds the slightest tang of honey. My captured hand strains round to touch a few fingertips to the soft hairs of his forearm. As he moves towards consciousness his arm gets lighter. He strokes across my chest, languidly at first, then inquisitively and, finally, with purpose as he locates the buttons of my pyjama top. He undoes the first two, before pushing his hand onto my bare chest.  
  
I suppress an exclamation, as every nerve dances. My mouth cools. He has pulled his off. He is whispering, saying in a thick voice, “You came to me. Draco. I hoped. … M’I dreaming? … I never thought … where are we?”  
  
I could stay silent, let him assume that this is a dream. So, he does dream of me! I should go now.  
  
I can shuffle round. The blanket is still between us. I move up against the mound that is his body. I get my mouth up to his ear.  
  
“Hospital wing,” I reply.  
  
The smooth skin of his earlobe calls to my tongue, but when I make contact, he moans. Hastily I get my hand over his mouth and ‘shush’ him.  
  
Surely, he pats down my arm to extract the wand from my sleeve.  
  
“ _Muffliato_ ,” he whispers. I don’t know that one. “Can’t hear us now,” he explains. His voice is still sleepy. “Missed your body. Want to … Why am I in hospital?”  
  
I don’t want to answer that. I feel along his arm and take my wand back. I don’t know whether to trust this spell of his. I don’t do trusting, not unless I know exactly what’s going on and what everyone’s motivation is. I replace my wand. I don’t respond. We must not get caught.  
  
“Draco?” He’s talking at a normal volume and now his voice is lost, scared.  
  
I can’t not tell him. I keep my voice low. “You drank some poison. You’re going to be fine.” I don’t know if that’s true.  
  
“That’s right,” he says. There is a soft lightness to his voice. His usual bravado is missing. “I keep waking up. Keep being told that. Keep forgetting.”  
  
He is talking at a normal volume now and nobody seems to be hurrying towards us. His words vibrate through his chest where it rests against mine. He wriggles his other hand free and touches my hair.  
  
“You feel so good,” he says. “Didn’t think I’d have this again. Wish I could see you.”  
  
I wish I could see him, too, but there would be too much risk in using Lumos and I don’t know where the Hand has gone. I’ve got to keep the Hand a secret. Even from him. Especially from him.  
  
His hands move between us, undoing more of my buttons. I roll my body towards his. Suddenly, I’m trapped by his arms again. They’re wrapped tight round me and I’m lifted up, on top of him, pressed to his chest. My own arms are trapped and useless against my sides. He squeezes. I’m having trouble breathing already, without him covering my mouth with his. His biceps spasm against my shoulder. I’m being crushed and suffocated. I’ve never been happier.  
  
One of his arms slips off me and I feel it twitching and thrashing. He is pushing at the blanket. With my newly freed arm I try to help him. Our lips slip apart, but with desperate, grasping, nibbling movements we re-attach them.  
  
I realise what the lump under my thigh is. Even through both pairs of pyjamas and the blanket it’s bruising. I roll my hips against him, rubbing my own erection against his belly.  
  
He swears, loudly, into my mouth.  
  
I blink stupidly in the dark.  
  
He kicks up under me, unbalancing both of our bodies, they move against each other to right themselves. Scratchy wool ripples downwards. Using our feet and hands we pull the blanket and top sheet free of the mattress and I manoeuvre my legs under it. Heat radiates from his body, drawing me towards it. The sheet is damp and warm. It smells of his sweat. I reached up and get my hands on what feels to be his shoulders, pulling our bodies together. He gasps.  
  
“Your feet are freezing!” he shouts out.  
  
I back away, apologising, but he grabs my elbow, pulls me back.  
  
“I’ll warm them up,” he murmurs tremulously.  
  
He makes a sharp movement, then his knees make brief knocking contacts and the mattress undulates. My feet are pressed between his calves, his bare-fleshed, soft-skinned, hairy calves. I’m only half aware, though, of the burning heat jolting from my icy toes, because the moist weight of his naked prick is now against my abdomen.    
  
I freeze, lying as still as I can. He doesn’t move either. For a moment it feels like we float in a void, a place without light, where the only sound is his heart and our tandem breathing, a place full of his smell where the only parts of me that live are those where his skin touches mine.  
  
A light but uncontrollable shaking starts up in my bones.  
  
I hold myself still, I do not reach out to touch his erection, nor to answer the insistent ache of my own. I should go now. I should stop this now. He will believe that he dreamed this. I must escape from the bed, find the Hand of Glory and sneak back to the dungeons, climb into my own bed and cry silently.  
  
Then he pounces. I am flung onto my back. His thigh lies across my hips, his mouth is on my neck, my throat, my collar bone. He is lips and teeth and tongue. His hands are pushing me. My chest is bare. His chest is bare. His pelvis is thrusting. He pants hard onto my skin. I am responding. I am drowning.  
  
My hands flutter, out of my control, touching every part of him. I want to focus, to remember this. I want to remember this forever. I am lost.  
  
One of his hands is in my hair, his mouth edges back to mine, he shifts his weight, slides his hard, hot, wet, heavy cock over my belly, pulling hairs with it. My crotch twitches upwards.  
  
In that instant, the silk lining of my well-cut pyjamas becomes the most agonisingly uncomfortable thing in the world. I grab the waistband, lift up from the bed, slamming against him as I wrench down the fabric.  
  
He gasps.  
  
Our skin burns, slipping, sweaty, wriggling.  
  
He is muttering guttural incomprehensibles on steamy breath against my temple.  
  
I am holding our two cocks in my one hand without knowing when the compulsion to do so or the decision to act came to me. I have drowned in the darkness, I have sunk into the void, my hand jerking without rhythm or control. His deep growl tremors through both of our ribcages, growing in volume, speed, intensity. Then it is a scream, no, a screamed word. It is “Draco!” and the boiling hot sticky liquid running over my hand and our pricks sends me beyond thought.  
  
Awareness crawls slowly out of bliss. He mutters beside me. I lie still, on my side, turned towards him. I can see a rectangle on the wall which is more pale than the rest of the darkness.  
  
I feel raw, as though my skin has lost a layer of protection. It is damp and chill air crawls over it. I shiver.  
  
That shape must be the window. Out there the sky has begun to lighten.  
  
I despise myself for having fallen back into that sensual abyss with him. This is not who I am supposed to be.  
  
His lazy inarticulate gibberish starts to sound like language.  
  
I stink.  
  
“Stay here,” he pleads. That, of course, is impossible. “You make me happy. I was so scared before.” I’m the one he should be scared of. I’m the most dangerous thing in this building and pretty soon I intend to let in more dangerous things. I hope they don’t hurt him.  
  
I sit up, pushing his limbs off mine, untangling myself from the body and the bedding.  
  
“What are you doing? Stay.” He flings his arms back round me. I’m tempted, so very tempted, but if I’m discovered here then we will both be rejected by our people. My only answer is to push his hands off me and slide out of the bed.  
  
I search systematically with my outstretched arms.  
  
“You make me feel so good, Draco.”  
  
He wouldn’t say that if he knew what I’d done.  
  
“Will we do this again?”  
  
I find fabric, but in the dark I can’t tell whose nightclothes it is.  
  
“Won’t we ever touch each other again?” His voice is cracking. I have to ignore it.  
  
Finally, with one finger I touch something abhorrent: cold, dead flesh. I grasp the Hand of Glory.  
  
I can see. I can see a sordid mess of untidy grey bedding in a characterless room. I can also see his perfect, flushed, white body sprawled on it. I can see the desolate expression on his face. I ache to kiss it away.  
  
Then he says, “I really like you, Draco.”  
  
He wouldn’t say that if he knew me. I find my pyjamas and put them back on, then collect up his nightclothes and place them beside him, tuck the bedding back as it was and creep back to my dormitory. 


End file.
